The prefect of Nièvre is waiting for winter with a firm footing. Daniel Barnier has planned everything, or almost, to get his troops through the bad season. With, as a priority, a change in behavior to lower the energy bill. Everything is recorded in a 19-page document. “As part of the common effort to ensure the ecological transition, the State must be exemplary by implementing measures to reduce energy consumption”, indicates the “sobriety plan” of the prefecture. In fact, we read a little further, natural gas represents 40% of the energy consumption of the State’s housing stock.
“We mobilized very early on”, immediately explains the prefect, in his large paneled office, referring to the circular signed, in February 2020, by Edouard Philippe, then Prime Minister. In this text, the State made twenty commitments aimed at making public services “eco-responsible”. But, continues Daniel Barnier, with the war in Ukraine, then the energy crisis, “we started thinking about a battle plan”.
This incorporates the various measures that have emerged through successive circulars since 2020, up to the government plan presented on October 6 to avoid load shedding and cuts. The most emblematic is obviously the lowering of office temperatures. In the former private mansion – and its “sixties” annex – which houses the departments of Daniel Barnier in Nevers, it will be 19°C. The same for the three sub-prefectures (Château-Chinon, Cosne-Cours-sur-Loire and Clamecy). At night, it will be 17°C; at the weekend, 16°C and 8°C if the offices are unoccupied for more than two days.
No more telecommuting
The prefecture is in the process of buying thermometers to measure the temperature in “control offices” within each service. A monthly monitoring table will allow you to see how this evolves over time. The fear is obviously the insidious return of the wheeled radiator. The prefect has decided to keep it simple: they will be banned. Moreover, they have already been inventoried, recovered and stored. In any case, there is still at least one… in the prefect’s office. The general secretary of the prefecture smiles: “Yes, but the heating is not working in this room. He never uses it anyway…”
Other staff could recover theirs. “We keep some in stock because we have some very cold officesfurther specifies Blandine Georjon. They will be allocated on request after verification and validation. » But, she continues, “If it’s 19°C in the office, we can only tell the agent to put on a sweater…” Moreover, during a visit to Nevers, at the beginning of September, it was the Minister of Transformation and the Public Service himself who put everyone at ease. “We don’t wear a tie in summer during the heat wave, we can walk around in a sweater in winter. We have to give ourselves this latitude”considered magnanimously, Stanislas Guerini.
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